LAUSD'S MIRAMONTE SCANDAL- HOW DOES IT HAPPEN? (VIDEO #5)
(For a national view of public education reform see the end of this blog post)
The Miramonte Child Abuse Scandal shows a disquieting picture of the Los Angeles Unified School District's (LAUSD) top-down model of school administration, where the defensive mechanisms that should have been in place to protect students were sabotaged by a culture where nobody dares contradict the principal and where blind support of the principal sanitizes even the most reprehensible individuals.
While the isolated behavior of a few teachers was allowed to go on by LAUSD administration for years in the Miramonte and other cases, the magnitude of harm done to a greater number of students, teachers, and others involved in LAUSD is far greater because of this culture where you move up by not questioning anything the principal does or doesn't do. What allowed the exploitation of students was a